How Peter Thiel’s Secretive Data Company Pushed Into Policing
A look at how Peter Thiel’s company Palantir is being used in law enforcement – the result of an in-depth investigation involving multiple freedom of information requests.
The Lost Civilization of Dial-Up Bulletin Board Systems
The author revisits the lost world of Bulletin Board Systems, and finds himself “strolling through a community frozen in time, Pompeii-style.” He finds discussions perfectly preserved, and in some cases maintained, since their heyday as an intimate precursor to the internet in the 1980s and 1990s.
You Are the Product
John Lanchester reviews three books on social media, the war for attention, and Silicon Valley giants. His conclusion? “I am scared of Facebook”.
Welcome to the Dark Net
A poacher turned gamekeeper hacker acts as a guide to the clandestine world of the dark net, a home for all sorts of illegal trade.
Palantir Knows Everything About You
An investigation into Peter Thiel’s data mining company reveals the extent of the surveillance done by government and corporate clients using their technology.
The complete history of the IBM PC, part one: The deal of the century
A detailed look at the birth and early childhood of the personal computer. http://www.bit.ly/arstechnica-ibm
Is Amazon getting too big?
A searching piece about Amazon and monopoly, published in a newspaper owned by Amazon’s CEO. If you have the time, it’s also worth dipping into the elegantly wrought 28,000 word ‘note’ in The Yale Law Journal that inspired the piece.
4chan: The Skeleton Key to the Rise of Trump
A message board allowing users to post anonymously has played a significant role in the recent history of internet culture (think – the birthplace of the meme), the development of new extreme right movements sometimes called the ‘alt-right’, and the series of events that put Trump in the White House.